David Alaba set up two goals for Marc Janko and scored one himself to help Austria to a convincing 4-0 win over Kazakhstan in their World Cup Group C qualifier.
Martin Harnik completed the scoring to give Austria their first win of the campaign and leave them behind the Republic of with four points from three games.
Austria were held 0-0 away by the same opponents on Friday but quickly took control. The visitors were twice grateful to Andrey Sidelnikov, first the goalkeeper parrying Harnik’s shot before collecting Zlatko Junuzovic’s subsequent header.
The home side then went ahead when Janko headed home 20-year-old Alaba’s cross after 24 minutes. Goal-bound shots by Marko Arnautovic were kept out by Sidelnikov and the hosts came even closer when Alaba volleyed a 25-yard shot against the post as Austria laid siege to the Kazakhstan goal.
The second goal was a near replica as Alaba, who plays left back for Bayern Munich and in midfield for his country, again crossed for Janko to head in after 63rd minutes.
Alaba, recently recovered from a stress fracture, crowned his performance by turning in Arnautivoc’s pass eight minutes later and Harnik completed an impressive win in stoppage time.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/YVIRIOZQ35EWRPZXR27KGMO6YU.png)